Parlamentares no ambiente digital: a influência das novas tecnologias de comunicação online no comportamento dos deputados federais

Abstract

The expansion of the internet and communication technologies in contemporary societies leads to the need to consider possible impacts on the forms of political representation and on the behavior of parliamentarians in this new digital environment. The literature points to a weakening trend of political parties as mediators of the population's interests, incentives for personalism in elections and an institutional framework favorable to the adoption of the internet and social media by Brazilian politicians. Legislative studies indicate that parliamentarians can be oriented by both a personalist and a partisan perspective to guide their actions. The question was whether personalization in the electoral arena would reflect on the role of parliamentarians in this new virtual environment, based on electoral connection. The general hypothesis formulated was that the expansion of the use of digital tools by the population and political actors favors the propensity of personalization in the performance of Brazilian legislators on the internet, even if this does not exclude partisan behavior. The methodology adopted was the content analysis of Facebook publications of Federal Deputies elected to the 56th Legislature (2019-2023) during the first weeks of the beginning of the term. Evidence was found to support the hypothesis of a predominantly individualistic online behavior of parliamentarians with a low presence of partisan and participatory elements. The results indicate that Brazilian politicians use Facebook pages primarily as a way to publicize their parliamentary activities and explore image assets along their virtual base on the social network